“The Iron Claw” and the Tragedy of Toxic MasculinityIn director Sean Durkin’s latest film The Iron Claw, he doesn’t sweat the historical particulars of the wrestling Von Erich family as he nearly overstuffs his film with the major bullet points from their Wikipedia. One brother in the litter of lions has been elided completely, Chris left on the cutting room floor due to run time constraints. In recounting their overwhelmingly tragic true story, Durkin tends to hustle from one occurrence to the next, as if the film must rush to keep up with a jam-packed inventory of traumas. But even in his deep affection and esteem for his subjects, he laments the Von Erichs as an extension of the cult phenomenon, an insular cell of devout believers unable to see beyond the corrosive thoughts and behaviors they’ve been sold as a path to perfection. If sport is religion in their house, they’re a splinter sect of zealots, taking their core pieties of competition and excellence to warped extremes. Whether Kevin (Zac Efron) still has the chance to “go clear” from his received masculine ideals becomes the dramatic fulcrum of a macho melodrama in which allowing yourself to be vulnerable represents the greatest victory of all. Durkin accepts the challenge as well, piercing these characters’ thickened skins with a tremulous sincerity that gently declines cruel dichotomies of strength and weakness, winning and losing. | 